New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1887-12-25
THE RELIGIOUS SIDE OF IT.


The Presidents message was not designed 10
be Christmas card for the American people.
II was intended to be a very plain and business
like presentation Of the argument In FAVOR OF
tariff revision in the interest of free trade.
One of the Presidents most faithful supporters
in the Boston press, with heart, and possibly
also head, softencd by the approach OF
Christmastide declined to take so prosaic and
unsentimental a view of this tariff essay. 10
his sensitive soul these uttcrances on the I'M
manageable surplus and the taxes on wool,
raw materials and ncccSsarcs were resonant
with religious significance. 1t was not an
official communication to the two houses OF
Congress on a subject which had been debated
with more or less animation for hundred
years but an echo of the Heavenly chorus
sung eighteen hundred and eighty odd years
ago Of "peacc on earth, good will to men,"
1t was a message attuncd to the harmones of
the first Christmas choir, since it proposed the
repeal of tariff which in principle and prac-
tice was contrary to the religion OF Christ
As this view of the message is sharply ac-
ccntuated in the intellectual centre of New
England we take It that our Democratic con-
tcmporarics generally will have revised their
usual Christmas articles for to-day and nave
discussed with fcrvor the religious side of free
trade. Certainly if Americans have made the
serious mistake of setting up an economic sys-
TEN that Is opposed in principle and practice
to the Christian religion, the message that
accords with the angelic chorus hymncd ut the
Nativity is not an inappropriate theme for the
day. Democratic editors, moreover who may
scramble into the pulpit this morning to de-
nounce the inlquty of war taxation and to pro-
claim the advent Of peace and goodwill In the
train Of free trade, can find texts and sermons
to plagiarizc by the hundred in the Golden
literature of forty years ago. That was the
undcrtOnc of Mr.. Cobdcns and Mr.. Brghts
speeches against the corn laws. High taxes,
they asserted. were antagoniStic to the Chris
tan religion. Under a universal system of
free trade wars were to cease peace and good
will were to reign throughout the world, and
the nations were to form an aifcctonatc brother
hood, whose chief concern was TO be the great
est good of the greatest number.
II may be harmless dcuSion for the PrcSi-
dents frcc-tradc admirers TO imagine that in
harping upon the war taxes they are hymnng
the original Christmas chorus Of peace. Yet
certainly it Is no more than kind and neigh
boriy to caution them against blindly accepting
the economic gospel Of free trade as inspired
truth-as something so sacred that it may not
be looked at or seriously questioned. Those
who with prccipitatc haste have rushed to the
conclusion that high tariff is unchristian and
the free-trade message a token Of the close APP
proach of the milIcnnial day when wars shall
cease and peace be undiSturbcd on the Garth,
need to be reminded that similar prophecies Of
Golden and his school have been falSiicd
The Presidents essay may perhaps be put 10
worse use than that of promoting religious
poemcs in Democratic newspaper Offices or
Of being caricaturcd as a Christmas card sent
to ovcrtaxcd America and dcSpairng Europe.
Ii it can be read with more JUNCTION to-day by
a dim religious light who shall interfere with
the pious editors novel experience IN attempt
ing to square his politics by the Golden Rule Of
the Gospel OF Galiicc? On the morrow he
will awaken from his nap in the cushioned pow
corner and be ready to believe that "Rcndcr
unto Caesar the things that are CRSars' may
possibly have antcipatcd any form II tariff